


Lexbelina

by Nicnac



Category: Smallville, Thumbelina (1994)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Humor, M/M, Parody, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-02-18
Updated: 2013-09-15
Packaged: 2017-11-29 16:30:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/689063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nicnac/pseuds/Nicnac
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Can you imagine the troubles for a little boy no bigger than your thumb? ...Especially when the world appears to be populated by idiots.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: In Which a Sorceress Sticks Her Nose Where It Doesn't Belong (But Things Work Out Anyway)

**Author's Note:**

> Woot, it's another Smallville/Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale fusion. This one follows the plot of Don Bluth's Thumbelina movie (which just to be clear is not actually Disney movie) fairly closely, but I'm still letting the characters to be themselves, so expect things to get a little silly.

Once upon a time there lived a pleasantly middle-aged woman named Lillian, who was altogether very happy with her lot in life. She had been engaged once when she was younger, but she had recognized her fiancée for the black-hearted man that he was, and so had run off. She had ended up getting herself a small farm that she could manage by herself and, because she had a very odd sense of humor, a hirsute dog she named after her no-longer-husband-to-be, Lionel. There she lived quite contently until a day not too long before our story begins.

On that particular day, Lillian had been settling down to dinner when someone knocked on the door. Lillian had opened it to reveal an old beggar woman and Lillian, as an act of kindness, invited the woman in to share her meal. To thank Lillian, the woman offered her a tiny barleycorn: “Plant it, and it will grow. And soon you’ll find an end to your loneliness.”

Lillian could have pointed out to the woman that she was not, in fact, lonely, and it was rather rude of her to make assumptions like that. But instead she just gave a slightly strained smile and thanked her. And the flower that grew was very beautiful, so over-all, Lillian had been quite happy with the arrangement.

Then came the day the flower opened up and a tiny boy, no bigger than her thumb, emerged.

_Well_ , she thought, _that was unexpected._


	2. In Which Romance Happens (Even if Neither of Them are Particularly Good at It)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I dropped out of the SVBB I thought I'd go ahead and share the one chapter I did get finished. Beta'd by the amazing jlvsclrk.

The very nice thing about pleasantly middle-aged women who are altogether very happy with their lots in life is that they also tend to be fairly practical. So while Lillian certainly wasn’t expecting to be suddenly gifted with a fully-grown son – for, in spite of the boy’s, or perhaps more accurately, young man’s exceedingly small size, he appeared to be about twenty years old – she wasted little time in getting him settled in and getting herself accustomed to living life with another person.

By the end of the week, they had gotten themselves a regular routine together and were settling down for their nightly reading from Lillian’s storybook. But before Lillian could even open the book to the story for the night, one about how a noble dog saved a king from a wicked wizard, which Lillian suspected Lionel would enjoy very much, Lex – she had named her small son Alexander after discarding any name with ‘thumb’ in it as too on the nose and not very pleasant sounding besides – interrupted her.

“Mother? Don’t you have any stories about people my size?” After an extremely harrowing experience earlier that day wherein Lex had nearly been baked alive inside of a pie, he was more interested than ever in finding a place that was designed for someone as tiny as he was.

“Of course dear,” Lillian said, somewhat abashed that she hadn’t realized herself that her son might be interested in such things.  She flipped ahead a few stories, opening the book to a little past midway, and a full page illustration depicting a man standing next to a mushroom that he, to all appearances, lived in.

Lex considered the pictures, both the full page one and the smaller one of a regally dressed couple holding hands on the adjoining page, for a few moments before asking, “Why do they have wings?”

“That’s a little like asking why a bird has wings. They’re fairies; they were born with wings,” Lillian explained.

“They can fly?” Lex said somewhat dubiously, for he was certain the gossamer-thin things depicted wouldn’t be capable of carrying a full grown person, even one as small as the fairies appeared to be.

“The one time I thought I saw one, he, or she, was riding on the back of a butterfly, but I can’t imagine why they’d have wings if they couldn’t fly,” Lillian said.

“But if they can fly, wouldn’t they not need to ride on butterflies?” Lex pointed out. Truthfully, a part of Lex didn’t want them to be able to fly; it seemed unfair that they could when he couldn’t.

“But if people can walk, shouldn’t they not need to ride in carriages?” Lillian retorted, and Lex had to concede his mother had a point.

“So fairies are real, then?” Lex asked. It was, after all, a book of fiction they were reading together and, as smart as he may be, Lex was still barely a week old. Lack of experience meant it was hard sometimes for him to distinguish the real from the fantastic. There was a note of hope in his voice that he was unable to suppress. He loved his mother dearly, but even the mere idea of a place where he could be more than his small size was too tantalizing to ignore.

“A lot of people say they aren’t, but I find myself believing in the supposedly impossible more and more of late,” she said, smiling fondly down at her son. Then, smoothing her hands over the well-worn pages, Lillian returned her attention to the story. “This is the tale of the marriage of the fairy prince and princess. Once…”

After the story was finished, Lillian declared it time for them all to go to sleep. She placed Lex down next to his bed – a walnut shell stuffed with the softest downy feathers they could find and covered by blankets of finely woven cotton – but didn’t tuck him in; he was a little old for that. Then, after thoughtfully leaving the book propped open to the illustrations that had so interested Lex earlier, she retired upstairs to her own bedroom.

As soon as the light from his mother’s candle disappeared up the stairwell, Lex climbed out of bed and walked over to look more closely at the drawings in his book. Here were the exact answers he hadn’t fully known he needed. The fairies in general represented a place where he could be normal, almost, and the royal court… If Lex could just get the king and queen on his side, or even a prince or a princess, then that would be his chance to be great. (Some would believe that Lex’s need to prove himself stemmed from his small size, but in truth, be he six centimeters or six feet tall, the desire for greatness ran soul deep in Lex.)

“Your majesties,” Lex said, aloud, practicing, and then he frowned to himself. What if, he wondered, the fairies used a different honorific for the king and queen, like highness or splendor? Or perhaps they didn’t speak English at all, using their own fae language instead.

After a minute or two of consideration, he decided there was very little he could do at the moment to prepare for either of those eventualities, so it was better to focus on the ones he could ready himself for, and went back to rehearsing. He did so out loud, because hearing his thoughts hanging in the air like tangible things always helped Lex to sort through them. He had little fear of anyone overhearing, the household being fast asleep and anyone outside being too far away. What he did not think to account for, however, were those beings with better than normal ears that might be flying around in the night.

So lost was Lex in his musings and imaginary conversations, and so assured was he of his privacy, he failed to notice one such being flying by the window on the back of another figure and landing on the sill, or the way the first figure – the second one being a bumblebee and much more interested in beautiful flowers than mysterious and beautiful men – stood there for a few minutes gazing in. Showing a level of stealth far greater than those who knew him would have suspected, the figured slipped in and hid betwixt the pages of Lex’s propped up book. Then, with a flourish and (what he hoped was) a very dashing smile, Clark – for the figure was in fact Clark, Prince of the Fairies –announced himself by using his sword to cut a window through the paper in front of him. “Mind if I cut in?”

Lex whipped around and his eyes went just the slightest bit wide in, Clark thought, stunned appreciation.

Clark, of course, was wrong. “Did you just destroy my book?”

Clark flitted through the gaping hole he had just created and his face glowed red almost as bright as his golden wings when he realized that he had indeed done just that. “I guess, but I didn’t realize… I can fix it!” He begun mumbling rapid fire under his breath searching for a power he could use to repair the book, to little avail. Little avail, that is, without factoring in how very endearing Clark’s distress and earnestness was.

“Okay, maybe I can’t fix it,” he finally said. “I’m really sorry.” Clark looked up at Lex through his bangs, quite a feat considering that Clark was two or three smidgens – a smidgen being a unit of measurement like an inch, but a good deal smaller, because fairies themselves are very small – taller than Lex when he wasn’t floating in the air.

This time when Lex’s eyes went just the slightest bit wide, it really was in stunned appreciation.

This strange man that had snuck into Lex’s house was without a doubt the most beautiful creature Lex had ever seen, an estimation that would stay with him even after he had more than just his mother and various animals around the farm to compare with. Lex allowed his gaze to wander over Clark’s form, crystal green eyes, a broad chest, honey-toned skin, and smiled to himself when Clark seemed to fidget a little in pleased embarrassment. It wasn’t until Lex was admiring the graceful lines of Clark’s wings that he realized what, somewhat inaccurately he was to later learn, he was seeing.

“You’re a fairy,” Lex said, his voice a pure statement of fact and betraying none of the surprise or glee he felt.

“Oh. Uh, yeah, I am,” Clark said. He felt the disappointment settle in his gut at having once again, or so he believed, misattributed the cause for Lex’s regard.

Lex heard the upset in Clark’s tone, but this time it was his turn to miss-guess the source, believing that Clark believed himself to be the victim of a particularly unusual type of species-ism. “I’ve just never met someone my size before. Someone humanoid that is,” Lex corrected, remembering the fairly unpleasant conversation he had had the other day convincing the spider in the living room to relocate her web outside.

“I’m glad to be our first, then,” said Clark, a flush overtaking his features once he realized what he had inadvertently implied. Lex unabashedly enjoyed the rosy color flooding Clark’s cheeks, though he had no clue why it was happening. (One must remember that Lex was only a week old, and Lillian, distracted with a myriad of other concerns, had yet to discuss matters of that particular nature with him.)

It was at this point that Lionel, who had been listening with half an ear since he had first been roused from sleep by the sound of a stranger’s voice in the house, decided that perhaps their late night visitor wasn’t as innocent as all that and needed to be chased off. Lionel leapt off his bed in the corner and dashed across the room, growling at the unwelcome intruder. And if his leap was more of a desperate flail and his dash more of an amble, his teeth were still sharp and his growl still menacing. Or so it must have appeared to Clark, for he leapt, this time by anyone’s definition, in front of Lex and was clearly preparing to fight off a ferocious beast, even if it was less clear to Lex and Lionel how he intended to go about doing so.

“Stop acting like children, both of you,” Lex, the one being present who might be considered qualified to act in such a manner, said, stepping smoothly between the two of them. “Lionel, this is my friend…” Here Lex paused and turned to Clark, waiting for him to fill in the blank.

“Clark,” he said after he caught on a few seconds later. “Clark Kent.” He sketched a brief bow in their direction as he introduced himself. Lex found in endearing; Lionel found it suspicious.

“Clark,” said Lex, making it sound as though he was finishing his earlier sentence, rather than echoing the name in his surprise at its straight-forwardness. From the story that Lex and his mother had read, he had been expecting something more elaborate or exotic, like Oberon or Robin Goodfellow, or even something like Mustardseed. “And Clark, this is my mother’s and my dog, Lionel.”

“I’m sorry about earlier,” Clark offered, referring to the way he had nearly attacked Lionel. Lionel, however, believed him to be talking about the extremely inappropriate, by Lionel’s estimate, comment Clark had made about Lex earlier. This was something of a fortunate understanding, since the latter was by far what Lionel was more upset about.

After one last searching look to gauge the sincerity of Clark’s contrition, Lionel padded back to his bed, and curled up once again in sleep.

“I really am very sorry about that, umm…”

“Lex, is my name,” he supplied and received a beaming grin from Clark.

“I like that,” said Clark. “It fits you.”

“Thank you, for that and for earlier. The thought was appreciated, even if your actions were unnecessary.” Lex said with a small smile of his own. “Though I am curious what you were planning on doing. Lionel is a good deal larger than you.”

Clark looked uncomfortably down at his shoes and half-mumbled, “I’m pretty strong.”

Lex puzzled over his behavior for a moment before deciding, incorrectly once again, that Clark must still be embarrassed about earlier, not to mention Clark did have a sword hanging on his hip, and Lex would hardly blame him for being reluctant to admit to his intention to cut Lex’s friend to ribbons. The superior strength was written off as a normal fairy gift. “Well, like I said, thanks for the thought,” Lex repeated, and he waited until Clark was looking up and voluntarily meeting his eyes again before Lex turned back to his book once more.

Clark, now presented with a view of Lex’s back, was struck by the sudden desire to approach Lex and do… something. He held himself back, though, because his parents had raised him well, and it would be rude to grab someone he just met.

“Well, are there?” Lex asked, tuning around and breaking Clark’s reverie. Clark reviewed the last few seconds in his head, hoping to prevent being caught out for his distraction. “Oh. Yes,” he said, once his subconscious, which had luckily been paying attention when the rest of him hadn’t, let him know what he missed. “There’s a fairy king and queen.”

Lex nodded. “And what do people usually call them?”

“King Jonathan and Queen Martha?” Clark said uncertainty, not clear what the question was exactly. The king and queen, being simple people, by nature if not by birth, had done away with much of the, quote, “nonsense bowing and scraping and your highness-ing,” years before Clark had come into their lives. Clark also neglected to mention that he primarily called them Mom and Dad, but he could be excused, perhaps, for hoping, three times over, to be judged by _who_ he was and not what.

“So they aren’t very formal, then,” Lex said, taking the information in and making some mental adjustments to his speech.

“Definitely not,” Clark agreed.

“What would be the best way to go about requesting an audience when them?” Lex asked.

“Oh, I’m pretty sure I can arrange something for you,” said Clark, his grin bright and edged with just a hint of slyness.

“Thank you,” Lex said. He spoke softly, because somehow over the course of the conversation the two of them had drifted closer and closer together so there seemed little reason to speak above a whisper. Very little reason to speak at all, in fact, when they were close enough to touch, close enough that if Lex just leaned in a little more-

A loud buzzing sounded outside the window, startling the two men, and making Clark wince. “Sorry, that’s my bumblebee, He, uh, he gets bored easily.”

“Well then, by all means, let’s go entertain him,” Lex said a little breathlessly. He turned quickly and slipped outside through the open crack in the window. Clark watched him go, cursing his bad luck. But just as he was convincing himself that he’d never be able to recover the missed moment, a brilliant idea occurred to him that almost made up for the interruption.

He followed Lex out into the night, where Lex was trying in vain to introduce himself to Clark’s bee.

“He can’t talk,” Clark informed him.

“He can’t?” Lex asked, incredulous. Clark merely shrugged and shook his head, seemingly unconcerned that his bee was one of the only, if not _the_ only, non-sapient creatures to be found.

“You know what would make him really happy?” Clark said.

“What’s that?” said Lex absently, still trying to figure out the mystery of the unintelligent bumblebee.

“If we took him for a ride.”

“A ride,” Lex echoed. He had by necessity gotten over the fear of heights he had been born with, but there was a big difference between standing near the edge of a nice solid piece of furniture with his mother or Lionel or one of the farm animals there to catch him and hanging midair on the back of a tiny little bee.

“Only if you want to,” Clark said, his bright expression dimming down to something almost miserable.

“I do. Want to that is,” Lex said. The prospect was still a bit terrifying, but Clark, Clark would save him if he fell.

“Great!” Clark enthused, and suddenly it was like the sun had come out in the middle of the night. “Here, climb on up,” he said. And if his hands lingered on Lex longer than entirely necessary while helping him up, then Lex, at least, wasn’t complaining. Clark jumped up in front of him and seconds later they were off.

At first it seemed just as frightening as Lex thought it would be. He shut his eyes tight and clung to Clark closer than entirely necessary (though Clark, at least, wasn’t complaining).But after the first few minutes when nothing happened, aside from Clark chattering on happily about all the interesting sights they were passing, Lex felt himself relax a bit. He didn’t loosen his grip any, but he did sit up straighter and open his eyes so he could actually see the things Clark was talking about. And what he saw took his breath away.

It wasn’t that the view was particularly spectacular from an objective standpoint – open fields, some late-blooming flowers, a small patch of pumpkins, a largish creek – but Lex had never been far beyond his house before. To him, even the most mundane of things were like a new world opened before him.

“Ready for the fun part?” Clark asked about ten or twenty minutes into their ride. He tossed a winning smile over his shoulder as he said it, the impact of which would have been completely lost, given that Lex couldn’t see it from where he was sitting, had Lex not been able to practically hear it in Clark’s voice.

“This isn’t the fun part?” said Lex. He had been enjoying himself fairly well after all.

“I’m not saying the scenic stuff isn’t fun,” Clark clarified. “Just, you haven’t seen what this guy can do when he let’s all out. We’ve got all kinds of neat tricks, huh buddy?” he added, giving the bumblebee a couple of fond pats on the side.

“You want to do tricks. Up in the air.” Clark might have a nice set of wings to save himself with, but Lex had no such thing. And doing ‘tricks,’ whatever that consisted of, didn’t sound conducive to staying on the bee’s back and avoiding imminent death.

Some of the uneasiness must have bleed into Lex’s voice because Clark lifted one hand up from his bee’s back and gave a few comforting strokes to the arms Lex had wrapped around him. “Hey, don’t worry. I won’t let you fall.”

Lex sighed, then shut his eyes and tightened his grip on Clark (his wings were getting quite squished by this point, but Clark still couldn’t find it in him to complain). “Alright,” Lex said. “Let’s do some tricks.”

Twenty seconds later, Lex fell.

He plummeted through the air, twisting as he fell, and landed face down into the same creek he had been admiring earlier. The impact forced the breath from his body, and when he gasped all he took in was water. Slowly the edges of the world around him fuzzed out and then everything went dark.

Meanwhile, Clark came out of the combination loop-de-loop-corkscrew, his wings fluttering a bit to keep balance. Then it struck him that his wings shouldn’t be fluttering at all because Lex should be pressing them tight up against his back.

He quickly turned around, but the only sign of Lex’s presence lay in the way the previously smooth and calm water was now choppy and disturbed. Clark dove in after Lex and frantically searched the water for any sign of him. Clark thought his heart would stop when he spotted the man he had already lost his heart to floating lifelessly in the water, a faint trail of water tinged lightly pink with blood marking his descent. Clark was certain his heart _did_ stop, just for a moment, when he pulled Lex up on the bank only to find he wasn’t breathing.

Desperate and unsure, Clark placed his mouth on Lex’s and forced air into him; if Lex couldn’t breathe himself, the Clark would do it for him. After a few breaths, Clark sat up again and started pushing on Lex’s chest, a vague notion that he might be able to make any water Lex had taken in leave his body that way. He was so focused on his task he hardly noticed the constant litany of pleas tumbling from his lips.

Lex awoke coughing and sputtering and feeling surprisingly hale, all things considered. When he opened his eyes, there was Clark dripping wet and panting with overwrought emotion, and a shock of want and need surged through Lex’s veins like destiny.

“Thank God,” Clark gasped out, and in one smooth movement he gathered Lex up in his arms, carrying him in a manner not dissimilar to an illustration in Lex’s book depicting a gallant knight carrying a swooning damsel. “Don’t worry, I’ll get you help.” Before Lex could protest to either the indignity of being carried or to the supposition that he needed help when, earlier scare aside, he was feeling fine, Clark took off.  He moved incredibly fast, far faster than the bumblebee, faster than the wind, faster even than thought it seemed, and all Lex could do was hold on as tight and as close to Clark as possible. And really, undignified or not, it wasn’t such a bad place to be.

Mere seconds later, the two of them arrived at a small boat floating amongst scattered lily pads in a section of the creek that had widened and slowed until it had formed a decent sized pool. “Dr. Bryce!” Clark called as he set Lex down on a chair sitting on the deck. “Dr. Bryce, it’s Pr- it’s Clark! My friend needs your help.”

“This had better be important; I have to get up early tomorrow.” Lex turned toward the new voice and spotted, standing in the doorway to the interior of the boat, a frog. A frog with breasts. Fairly large ones, too.

Lex was so busy trying to figure out how a frog would have developed breasts (by having a plastic surgeon for a father and an endless fascination with the fairy ideal of beauty) that he failed to notice the way Dr. Bryce’s eyes lingered on Lex’s decided lack of wings. Clark, however, did notice her looking and it set him on edge even before she asked with an odd note to her voice, “Who’s your friend, Clark?”

“His name is Lex. He fell in the water a few minutes ago and nearly drowned, plus he split his lip pretty bad. Lex, this is Dr. Helen Bryce, I was hoping she could take a look at you and make sure you’re okay.” Lex was once again planning on objecting to the implication that he needed help, but was once again prevented from doing so, this time by Clark’s big green pleading eyes. It couldn’t hurt to get looked out since they were already here, even if Lex did think Clark was exaggerating the direness of the situation a bit. His lip barely even stung, though the area around it did feel fairly tacky with drying blood.

“Don’t touch that,” Dr. Bryce snapped emerging from the inside of the boat, where she had retreated after Clark’s pronouncement, now carrying a blanket and a medium sized bag that looked like it held medical supplies. Lex dutifully removed his hand from his upper lip – really only a shallow little cut, Clark had definitely been exaggerating – in time to grab the blanket Dr. Bryce draped over his shoulders.

“Normally I’d want you to get out of those wet clothes as soon as possible, but I don’t have anything on hand that will fit you, so hopefully this will keep you warm until you can get home and change,” Dr. Bryce said, and Lex accepted the blanket gratefully. While the days were still long and hot, the onset of fall meant there was a distinct chill in the air once evening set in, and Lex’s wet clothing wasn’t helping matters any. But before Lex could completely cocoon himself in the blanket’s warmth, the doctor placed a hand on his arm while the other reached down in her bag and pulled out something that, had Lex known it, somewhat resembled a stethoscope. “I need to listen to your breathing first,” she explained. With some reluctance – now that he was thinking about it, it really was very cold – Lex left the front of the blanket hanging open and, at Dr. Bryce’s gesture, rucked his shirt up to facilitate her task.

Clark watched Dr. Bryce intently as she examined Lex – or he did once Lex’s shirt was covering his torso again, but it was hardly _Clark’s_ fault that Lex’s naked chest was so distracting – but she went about the whole thing in such a considerate, yet no-nonsense manner that Clark began to feel ashamed for his earlier suspicions. After all, Dr. Bryce was the only one besides Clark’s parents that knew the whole truth about Clark, and she had never done anything to betray him. He should have known better than not to trust her.

“Well, aside from your lip, you look to be in good shape,” said Dr. Bryce, concluding her examination. “I’ll just get that cleaned, disinfected, and bandaged for you, then I want you to go straight home for dry clothes and rest, understood?”

“Understood,” Lex agreed easily. That’s what he had been planning on doing anyway.

“Good,” Dr. Bryce said. She reached in her bag and pulled out a cloththat she dosed in a stinging liquid that she proceeded to wipe Lex’s face off with. Halfway through the job her eyes widened and her careful strokes became quicker and rougher. She finished a moment later and stepped back, a small gasp of surprise escaping her lips.

Worried that Lex might be hurt worse than he suspected , Clark moved in closer, then blanched when he saw what Dr. Bryce’s cleaning had revealed. There, where not five minutes before Lex’s lip had been split nearly in half, was whole and healthy skin – marred only by a small scar that Clark knew hadn’t been there before.

“What…?” Dr. Bryce began.

“I guess you were right Lex, it really was all from where you bit your tongue,” Clark said quickly and extremely unconvincingly. “I just saw all that blood and thought you _had_ to have cut your lip too.”

It was abundantly clear that Dr. Bryce didn’t believe Clark any more than Lex did and Lex knew for a fact that he was lying. She gave Clark an incredulous look, before turning to Lex, nonverbally asking him to confirm what they both knew was the truth.

“I did try to tell you that you were overreacting, Clark,” Lex said smoothly. If Clark wanted to lie to Dr. Bryce for some unknown reason, then Lex would do his best to make it at least partially believable.

“I guess that’s that I get for not listening,” Clark said with a self-deprecating grin. “Thanks for the help Dr. Bryce,” he added and Lex echoed the sentiment a moment later.

“You’re welcome,” Dr. Bryce said, giving them a slightly suspicious look. “Just make sure you go straight home and to bed. No dilly-dallying.”

“Sure thing,” Clark said, right before he whistled for his bumblebee. “I’ll make sure I take care of him.”

“I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself,” Lex objected, but Clark’s only reply was a sunny grin. Dr. Bryce rolled her eyes at the two of them, then walked back inside the boat, very deliberately closing the door behind her.

The ride home was a cold and wet one for Lex and, consequently, probably should have seemed miserable and long as well. But sitting nestled in front of Clark with an exceedingly strong arm wrapped around him just a bit too tight, as though Clark wanted to make absolutely, positively, one hundred percent _sure_ Lex wasn’t going to fall again, was anything but miserable and the ten or so minute journey passed relatively quickly.

“So,” Lex said once they had disembarked back at his window, “mind telling me why we were lying to Dr. Bryce?”

Clark blinked at him in surprise. “I was just trying to protect your secret. If you had just told me you had an accelerated healing ability, I wouldn’t have even taken you to Dr. Bryce in the first place.”

“You didn’t give me time to say much of anything before carrying me off like a distressed damsel,” Lex retorted automatically. It wasn’t until a second or two later that the actual content of what Clark had said hit him. Secret? And an accelerated healing ability? What in the world was Clark talking about?

Clark flushed and ducked his head in embarrassment. “I was just really worried about you,” he muttered and any annoyance that Lex might have, but probably hadn’t, felt vanished like the morning mist.

“It’s fine, just make sure you actually stop and listen to me next time,” Lex told him.

Clark looked at him, frank horror written across his face. “What next time? Nothing like that should ever happen _ever_ again.”

“Abstractly speaking, of course,” Lex clarified with an amused smile. “I fully intend on avoiding any more near-death experiences in the future.” Clark calmed down a bit, but still kept a wary eye on Lex, as though he expected Lex to go find a convenient stream to attempt to drown himself in any second now.

“I do have another question for you,” Lex said, after giving Clark a few moments to assure himself of the lack of nearby bodies of water. “You said something a moment ago about my secret healing ability; what exactly were you referring to?

“You know, your healing ability,” Clark said. When that failed to generate anything other than more polite confusion from Lex, _Clark_ started to get confused. “Lex, your lip was split practically clean in two when I pulled you out of the water, but by the time Dr. Bryce cleaned your face all that was left was a scar that looks like it’s been there forever. That’s not exactly normal, so I just assumed you got caught in the meteor shower and were changed like a lot of other people were.”

“I’ve never been in any meteor shower,” Lex objected, unaware that while he personally hadn’t been caught in the shower, the barleycorn he was born in had grown from the very same field the meteors had hit. “Besides if this was something that happened to a lot of people, why would you assume it was a secret?” 

“Everyone who was affected had something different happen to them, so it’s kind of personal. Plus it’s… well, it’s weird, so people don’t like to talk about it,” Clark said. 

“I see why you might have made that assumption, then. The only real difference is I come by all my weirdness naturally,” Lex said. 

Clark winced. He was used to using those words – weird, strange, odd, unusual – to describe himself, he forgot that Lex was listening and might think Clark was talking about  _him_. “Hey,” Clark said, softly reaching out to touch Lex. He had only intended a light, comforting touch to Lex’s arm, but somehow Clark wound up with his whole hand wrapped around Lex’s bicep, his thumb stroking back and forth across the still damp shirt. “I’m not exactly normal either. In fact, I’ll bet I’m a whole lot weirder than you are.” Unless Lex was also secretly a vampire or something, Clark had to be. Alien was pretty hard to beat on the weirdness scale.  

“At least I’m not alone,” Lex said, and probably it was supposed to sound dry and bemused but Clark could hear the echoing loneliness in the words. 

“You’ll never be alone again,” Clark swore and, struck with sudden inspiration, he slipped his insignia ring off his finger and onto Lex’s to seal the promise. 

Lex watched as Clark slid his ring on a very particular finger of Lex’s, but when Lex looked up to ask the question that flitted across his mind, he was distracted by how very close Clark was. As close as he had been earlier, but this time Lex wasn’t interested in taking the first convenient excuse to back away. This time he was going to lean in and press – 

Clark yanked back, turning his face away and covering his eyes as though he couldn’t even bear to  _look_  at Lex. For a second the world froze as the disappointment and sorrow and  _hurt_  filled Lex to the brim. Then the real world started up again, invading Lex’s senses with Clark’s stumbled litany of apologies and the smell of… burning wood? 

“… oh God, Lex I’m so sorry. So, so sorry, I didn’t mean…” 

“Clark,” Lex said, trying to keep his voice even as he looked at the two neat scorch marks on the window sill, right where Clark’s gaze would be focused if he wasn’t covering his face. “Did you burn the sill with your eyes?” 

“… usually have more control over it, you were just so close and looking at me like  _that_ , and I was just so happy and –“ 

“Clark, stop,” Lex said, and Clark cut off abruptly. “Just to be clear, a second ago you shot fire from your eyes and at the window, correct?” 

“I don’t think it’s fire so much as beams of heat, but pretty much, yeah,” Clark said. 

“And the reason these beams of heat shot of your eyes is because you were pleased with what was happening between us?” Lex said, the intended statement coming out as more of a question. 

“God yes,” Clark breathed, and Lex smiled. 

“Alright,” said Lex, figuring it could have been a lot worse. Clark could have actually hit him with that not-fire, or not have wanted to kiss Lex at all. Gently, Lex touched both of Clark’s wrists with his fingertips. “Do you think you have control of it now?” 

“I think so,” Clark said and he cautiously peeked through a small gap in his fingers. When nothing else set alight, he pulled his hands the rest of the way down, giving Lex a sheepish look. 

“Is that going to happen every time?” Lex asked. Not that he wouldn’t be willing to find a way to work around it, but it would really be very inconvenient. 

“I really,  _really_  hope not,” Clark said. 

“Do you want to try again? Maybe with this time your eyes closed,” Lex suggested. 

Clark’s eyes lit up, thankfully just in a metaphorical way this time, and dimmed again just as quickly. “There’s something I should probably tell you first; before we do anything else,” he said guiltily. 

Lex raised an eyebrow. “Is this where you confess to being affected by the meteor shower?” 

“Not exactly. The truth is...” Clark stopped and took a deep breath in to steel himself. It felt  _right_  telling Lex, but Clark had still never told anyone before. “The truth is –”

“Clark Kent!” called a voice in the distance. 

Clark started and looked off in the direction the sound had come from. “Mom?” he said, confused. He glanced up at the stars and, seeing what time of night it was, he winced.  “Shoot, I was supposed to be home a long time ago. 

“You’re leaving?” Lex asked, though it was fairly evident from the way Clark was crossing over to his bumblebee. Still, they had been in the middle of something, several somethings, in fact. 

“I’m so sorry, but I really have to go. It’s the first day of autumn so there’s this parade thing and all the royal family  _has_  to attend. It’s one of the few traditions my parents won’t change,” Clark explained.  

“Clark,” Lex said slowly because he was still putting it together in his head, but not too slowly because Clark was clearly about to do a runner, “were you going to tell me that you’re the prince of the fairies?” Because that’s certainly what he seemed to be implying. Though Lex wasn’t sure what the connection was between that and the heat beams. Maybe it was a power all princes had? 

“No. I mean yes,” Clark said, thoroughly confusing the matter. “I mean, no, that’s not what I was planning on telling you, but yes, I am the fairy prince. Look I’ll come back tomorrow and explain everything then, I promise, but I really have to go now.”

“Fine, I’ll see you tomorrow,” Lex agreed, not particularly happy about it, but he did understand that Clark might have prior obligations. He raised his hand to wave good-bye to Clark, who was already astride his bee at that point, when a glint of reflected moonlight caught his eye. “Wait, before you go –“ 

_“Clark Jerome Kent!”_  

“No time, got to go,” Clark said, taking off into the night. “Bye Lex, I’ll be back tomorrow!” 

Seconds later Clark had disappeared, leaving Lex standing by himself out on his window sill, looking at the ring sitting on the ring finger of his left hand.  “I guess I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to find out if I’m engaged or not,” he muttered, then he shook his head, a soft smile on his lips. Even with Clark’s abrupt and rather ambiguous departure, Lex couldn’t find it in himself to even pretend to be annoyed.  

He stood there for a few moments longer, and then turned around and went back inside. He stripped off his damp and uncomfortable clothes before pulling on a dry set and, still smiling, slipping into bed and off to sleep. 

He left the ring on, just in case.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Lexbelina (Bumblebee Ride)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7670257) by [Lost_Heart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lost_Heart/pseuds/Lost_Heart)




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